what are cows?
John posted this the other day and tagged me in it/
Unfortunately probably not going to escape pretension.
What is art? Surely it’s more interesting and valuable to ask ‘what is an artist?’? Otherwise it’s like asking ‘what is milk’ without any curiosity for cows.
My understanding of an artist is someone who is continually trying to make sense of the world. An artist will often use processes and actions that are culturally learned and associated with being an artist (but sometimes not – as my friend Seb will run and treat running as an artistic practice). An artist will often use materials of subjective value and will sometimes situate what they produce in a white gallery or on a wall in someone’s living room. But also not, and in some ways it could be said that the context not only decides whether or not the art is ‘art’ and not ‘not art’, but also determines the process and is inextricable from the outcome.
You can find out what a ‘cow’ is by asking people, google image search, the dictionary. But probably the best thing to do is go to a field where they are said to be and go and see for yourself. Stand on the rough grass, smell the sweet, sweaty smell of their poo, see the heaviness of the cow, look at her unique markings, see the way she stands awkwardly, chewing on one side of her mouth. Their initial shyness, their incredible curiosity.
Producing milk is not the only thing that a cow does. Essentially, milk is a cow’s way of keeping cows cows, nourishing their young so that the little cow will grow up to be a big cow. Maybe that’s why cows have such a sense of melancholy around them. I would if I knew that the only things people value in me were the things I produce – not who I am. Or maybe that’s why when they get milk to make Salers de Buron cheese, the cow is convinced that she is feeding her calf not a farmer, “so you carefully remove the calf from the udder and continue extracting the milk while maintaining the illusion that the baby is still there.”
Maybe one role of an artist is to question answers.
An artist is part of a discourse which is ongoing, and art is not so much about milk – or even making milk – as it is lying down just before it rains.
Here’s a music video I made for The Dancing Dead’s new single Ghetto Scissors. - Download the song here.
Sampled from a childrens’ bicycle safety film ‘One Got Fat’ produced by Interlude Films, 1963. The original is a peculiar, strangely horrible work narrated by Edward Everett Horton and is now in the public domain and can be seen here.
Happy watching / listening
Here is a short extract from Allan Kaprow’s lecture ‘How to make a happening’.
Vacuum cleaner. Museo Vostell Malpartida de Cáceres. Spain.
Photoset from our performance RECourrcity Runners premiered in the foyer of Battersea Arts Centre, 15/10/2011 at Freshly Scratched performance evening.
pretty things
I think I realised something was a bit askew with my attitude today when, after days of not being able to speak to my atlantic separated favourite person in the whole world, her beautiful, pixelated, skype-blurred face asked me how I was and I said something along the lines of “I’m too deeply entrenched in pythagorean geometric ideologies to function properly”. Pretentious and Silly. I think I need to play more, and play with pretty things.
And I’m glad I put up that snap of the swirling stars, because it’s pretty.
a snippet of mine and Dad’s drone/organ jam
